Thursday, January 03, 2008

The band is on the screen!

A post at the commentating panopticon Awful Announcing expresses incredulity that Fox showed the WFVU and Oklahoma marching bands 58 times during last night's Sugar Bowl.

And that's a bad thing?

We may be biased here at the HSR, but the cameras should be focusing on the bands at least that much. College marching bands are a consistent source of coordinated chants, animated cheers, flashy instruments, and students always cheering loudly. For all the work they put in they rarely get televised attention for it. With the notable exception of the Rose Bowl, pregame and halftime are rarely shown unless they can fit it in between commercials for whatever sports drink sponsored this presentation.

Ironically, during the 29 theoretical times they showed Oklahoma's band, they were probably playing Boomer Sooner during each one. It's certainly not as annoying as USC's pep dirge (which they played at least sixty times during last year's Rose Bowl), but it doesn't help to look so uninspiring when you finally get the airtime.

Anyway: We applaud Fox Sports' BCS bowl game producers for showing off an essential element of the pageantry and tradition of college football. Keep it up.

3 comments:

Agatha Christie said...

Was it just me, or did ABC (a channel that is historically band-friendly) not show either bands during the Capital One Bowl except for 15 second snippets?

pz said...

I agree that there needs to be more prominent feature of bands throughout CFB games.

I only counted one time aside from halftime when the cameras gave a decent look at the M band during the Capital One bowl. (Of course, I spent a decent amount of time celebrating or being frustrated after plays and probably not looking at the TV.)

Anyhow, I wish Fox could find a new camera angle - its like the camera is in the stands. Nice for the 6 folks they show (and the instruments above) but I would prefer a wider-angle shot.

Unknown said...

My sister in SEC-land, who was rooting for Michigan on my behalf, called at halftime to chat and said, "Oh, y'all's band looks good!"

So, someone noticed, anyway.